If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

There's a joke I really want to make but can't figure out the right way to make it. So I'm just going to post about really wanting to make a joke instead of actually making the joke. Mediocre Internet 101.

There's a joke I really want to make but can't figure out the right way to make it. So I'm just going to post about really wanting to make a joke instead of actually making the joke. Mediocre Internet 101.

I do that all the time!

Originally Posted by Jojan

So really, The Offspring is only Ron. The rest of the band left. O_o

Originally Posted by XYlophonetreeZ

For selfish reasons, I hope he's really dead. I really don't want to become known as "That guy who keeps making premature death threads for ethnic-looking dudes."

What you are is struggling to integrate other people's narratives into your own. It's a problem all of us struggle with, and it's by far the hardest way to deal with other people - but it remains all the more rewarding for all that.

I had an incredible professor, Malcolm Blincow, who just retired this year. He told my class that "Anyone can attack the weak points in an argument, and it is a particularly prevalent practice in academic work. But if you believe that you can truly disprove an argument, attack the strong parts. It deserves nothing less." I'm paraphrasing from a brilliant teacher here, but he struck a very strong chord with me. The less petty the elements you are forced to focus on, the more you must respect your opponent. And this is directed at pretty much everyone here.

I would agree that I "struggle to integrate other people's narratives into [my] own". A lot of my judgements place a lot of weight on personal experience. Even though I try to understand the limits of personal experience, and the important of empirical evidence, I also feel like certain people tend to gravitate towards using established theories to explain all behavior, and miss out on some of the truth because of it. It's a complicated matter that I can't fully explain. I almost feel as though academia in general is too confident in it's theories to explain many phenomena. Perhaps I could think of an example later, but I wanted to at least explain it first. But that's mostly where my "anti-intellectual" sentiment comes from.

And just for the sake of mentioning it, I really like that quote by your teacher. It popped into my mind several times since I've read it a few days ago.